Serving the High Plains
Serving the High Plains
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We try to recognize birthdays and anniversaries at church in advance and we occasionally see a look of relief on the face of someone who was rescued by the reminder. Otherwise, sometimes we get a second chance and do it the following week. Every once in a while there’s a look of terror when someone forgot and missed their opportunity, or there’s the stare of glare from the overlooked party (have you ever noticed how vivid the color of your beloved’s irises when surrounded by the whites of her eyes?). Warning guys! Next Wednesday is Valentine’s...
After ordering at a local fast food restaurant recently, the counter person asked for a name to associate with my order. She asked me how to spell my name, and I responded with, “I-T”. She took on a puzzled look, as did the counter person to her left, while the one to her right immediately began laughing. After I explained the joke to her, I gave the real spelling The person to her left remained silent for a few more moments and then nodded his head with a chuckle indicating that he had finally gotten the joke. Many people have a problem get...
I received the following at a meeting late last year. The person distributing it couldn’t recall the source, but I suspect it’s one of those forwarded emails. It’s entitled, “’They’ is You and Me.” “God is just. It’s his character, who He is, and it’s something He wants us to pursue. “Justice seeks to make wrong things right. It is us working throughout our lives to fix injustices in the world around us. Every time we see something that’s wrong, our first response should be to pray about it. Our second response should be to ask ourselves, ‘W...
Here’s an ear-witness account of part of a child’s bedtime prayer on Christmas night 2016: “Dear Heavenly Father, Thank you for all the presents I got today (naming each one twice). Please thank Santa for bringing them. . . . In Jesus’ name, amen.” He thought of that on his own and it pleased me that he recognized God’s and Santa’s places in Christmas. A lot of “mature” Christians have a problem with Santa Claus because they see a conflict between believing in God and believing in Santa as if “believing” in anything equated it with God....
Depending on when you read this, it’ll be about 10 days until Christmas Eve. You can bet that until then, the younger people might ask, “Is it almost Christmas yet?” Once they’re seven or eight, though, they’ve learned about calendars, and at least some of them will figure out exactly how many days it is until Christmas, and they’ll remind you multiple times every single day. I usually respond to that with, “So, you’d better be good!” That might quiet him for a while, especially if he’d recently gotten into trouble at school. Nonetheless...
Thanksgiving is next week. While Thanksgiving and harvest festivals are celebrated at various times during the year throughout the world, you remember the historical basis for this great American holiday – how the Pilgrims in Massachusetts joined with the local Native Americans in thanking their Creator and Provider after the Pilgrims had survived a rough first year with the Indians’ help. (While there are other accounts about the Pilgrim – Indian relationship and claims of earlier celebrations in the New World and even a similar celeb...
There are eight significant holidays or festivals on the original Jewish calendar (Leviticus 23:1-44). The first three festivals (Passover, Unleavened Bread, and Firstfruits) fell within eight days of each other in early spring. Passover occurred on the 14th of the first month of their calendar and the seven-day Feast of Unleavened Bread began the next day. The Feast of Firstfruits occurred on the first day of the week (Sunday) after Passover and would’ve been no later than the last day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread. Firstfruits commemorated...
I get the most out of sermons when I take notes and can check up later on things that are especially helpful or don’t sound right. So, I highly recommend it to others. During one recent sermon, our preacher said something like, “Don’t let the wisdom of the world fool you.” Sometimes I abbreviate words to keep up and I abbreviated that, “Don’t be fooled by WoW.” When I reread that, I thought, “Hmm! We can be WoWed by the wisdom of the world and follow a path that doesn’t lead to heaven (Matthew 7:13-14)!” While Jesus is the way (“the” meaning...
I was eating a half-wrapped hamburger once and felt something I couldn’t chew up. So, I picked it off the tip of my tongue, finding what turned out to be a bit of the wrapper. My very first thought was, “Hmm looks like I bit off more than I could chew.” Usually that term refers to someone who messed with someone else or their character or property and came up on the short end of the stick. It also means that someone took on more responsibility than they could handle, often just to receive the honor attached to the responsibility, but with the h...
Albeit with good intentions, parents sometimes cause their children problems. My daughter has chastised me several times about one such instance: We hyphenated her first name with both components capitalized and abbreviated it “L-A.” So, for insurance or other “legal” documents, her first name often gets entered into the computer incorrectly and she has to call to find out how they spelled it because their computer doesn’t recognize her. There’s a probably-false account about a Deep South woman who named her daughter “L-A” and got angry when...
A couple of weeks ago, I attended the memorial service for my dear friend, Sandy Pruitt – a great Christian lady. As I listened to the comments of those presiding and attendees who recounted memories, several things occurred to me about her life and the past, present and future for the Christian and the fact that God is the God of all comfort who comforts us in our troubles so that we can comfort others (2 Corinthians 1:3-7). Regarding the past, Sandy loved the Lord and his body, the church (Matthew 16:13-19; Colossians 1:18; 1 Corinthians 12:1...
‘My country ‘tis of thee, Sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing; Land where my fathers died, Land of the pilgrim’s pride. From every mountainside, let freedom ring.” The year is nearly half over and Independence Day will be celebrated next week. Because it falls on Tuesday this year, many might take Monday off to make it a four-day celebration, although, I wonder how many will actually meditate on our nation’s history and the freedoms we enjoy. They might just view it as another opportunity to free themselves of the daily grind of work. Ame...
Today is National Flag Day, celebrating acceptance of the American flag’s design on this date in 1777. Although celebrated since at least 1885, Flag Day wasn’t a holiday until 1916, and it didn’t become a national holiday until 1949. In a 1914 Flag Day address, Interior Secretary Franklin Lane quoted the flag’s “statement” to him that morning as, “I am what you make me; nothing more. I swing before your eyes as a bright beam of color, a symbol of yourself.” Our Star Spangled Banner deserves respect because it symbolizes the unity and great...
School will be out in Tucumcari this week and high school graduation will take place. So first, please watch out for all the youngsters who’ll be out enjoying the extra time they have. Besides being a Christian responsibility, because we’ve been so blessed as a nation, looking out for the best interests of others is an American responsibility in honor of those who’ve given their time, not to mention in many cases, their very lives, to protect our rights and freedoms at home and abroad (Philippians 2:1-8; Matthew 20:25-28; Luke 12:48b; 1 Thess...
By now, you probably don’t remember those very windy days on March 23 and 24, especially because it’s been pretty windy since then. Our grandson was out playing after school on March 23 and his cap blew off. He gave chase until he lost sight of it. We hoped it got caught in a woven-wire fence about 500 feet away, but he walked that fence line and it wasn’t there. On March 24, the wind was even stronger and from the opposite direction. When I went out on the morning of March 25, the cap was back in our yard. This incident brought a few things to...
Last Sunday many congregations, including ours, sang the much-loved song written in 1874 by Robert Lowry, “Christ Arose,” also known as “Low in the Grave He Lay.” This song tells of the greatest historical event of all time — historical because it has a large number of eyewitnesses whose testimony is still on record (Acts 1:1-26; 1 Corinthians 15:1-8; 1 Peter 1:17-25). Some were glad about the event while others tried to conceal it, although, they knew it actually happened (Matthew 28:1-17; Mark 16:1-14; Luke 24:1-48; John 20:1-31; Acts 4:1-...
Continuing the theme of March weather: March came in like a lamb if you consider sunny, 70 degrees, with 10 mph winds to be mild weather. The forecast for the month’s last day on Friday is for mostly sunny, 79 degrees, and 24 mph winds. That’s certainly more wild than mild. Without regard to our interpretation of lion and lamb as they pertain to March weather, there is one point about lambs and lions on which Christians can agree. That is, Jesus is both the Lion and the Lamb. He’s the Lion of the Tribe of Judah, having the right to rule over...
While growing up in eastern Kentucky, I recall hearing about a prison sentence called, “life and a day,” to impose the most severe sentence short of the death penalty. Elsewhere, the sentence was called, “life without parole.” Merle Haggard sang about that, remembering daily his mother’s love in trying to keep him out of trouble. Yesterday was Valentine’s Day. Therefore, today, we can celebrate love and a day. As Christians, we can and should celebrate perfect love every day as we’re reminded of the great things God has done for us in addition...
My wife and I like Chinese food, and we often enjoy the messages in the fortune cookies, although we don’t expect the promises to be fulfilled. We had a lot of fun with the fortunes recently, because while our fortune cookie messages seldom have any connection, this time it got interesting. My wife’s read, “Your judgment is a little off at this time. Rely on friends,” (I’m glad she didn’t get that fortune at our wedding rehearsal dinner, which was almost exactly seven years ago at a Chinese restaurant). Then, I opened my fortune cookie and...
Although we actually just went from one day to the next, we’ve just passed into a New Year. While the 366 days to be remembered as 2016 were filled with tragedy and triumph, it isn’t the focus of this article to list the epic events of the past year, whether good or bad, especially since much of it was rehashed in the media over the last few weeks. That being said, it does seem that we dwell on the tragedies and forget the triumphs. The Bible encourages us to forget the past, good or bad, and focus on the future with hope. Forgetting the pas...
While Dec. 7, 1941, was called “a date which would live in infamy,” the attack on Pearl Harbor isn’t as widely remembered as it once was, possibly because of the events of Sept. 11, 2001, and possibly because the generation who experienced the attack first-hand is mostly gone. Another event took place on Dec. 7, 1868, when Jesse James robbed a bank in Gallatin, Missouri, and killed a man. How many of us knew about that or even who Jesse James was? The problem with forgetting history is that studying it prepares us for internal and exter...
Sometimes you just can't win. My wife was taking a youngster to pre-school one day and as they crossed the railroad overpass on U.S. 54, the child saw some cars on the sidetrack and commented that the train was moving. No amount of discussion would convince him otherwise, including his acknowledgment that there was no engine. But, that's not the whole story. On the way home after school, the cars were still there, but the train was still moving according to the little boy. And, there's more. The next day the cars were gone and youngster...
I was jesting with a friend recently who made a statement I knew was an exaggeration. So, I told her I thought she needed to go forward on Sunday and repent. My friend let me know that she goes by church twice every day. Drive-by shootings have occurred at last since shortly after cars came into mass production. But I've never heard of drive-by church attendance before. As it turns out, my friend attends (yes, that's present tense; remember that) a church that happens to also be on her way to work. While I'm pretty sure my friend attends...
Sometimes it takes a real knock to the head for us to pick up on a concept. That literally came to my mind recently. You see, I've always been bothered by the sun shining through the windshield between the visors. No matter how the visor is tilted or angled, it still doesn't completely block out the sun and I have to reposition my body to avoid the glare, sometimes uncomfortably. While getting back into the car after fueling up recently, I bumped my head against what had been an almost perfectly positioned sun visor and felt it move away from m...
Most people have a fairly unique talent that may be viewed by others as particularly odd. At least, I hope that describes most people because of a peculiar talent I have. I try to keep my little stretch of road clean by picking up the trash several times each year. Some travelers are just trashy and I find a lot of trash, even if I'd just recently made a pass. Over the years, this has helped me develop a keen eye for trash. Even a small piece sticks out like a sore thumb. Often, while walking across the right-of-way to pick up something I saw...